Apple has offered to relax its grip on the ebook market in order to fend off
accusations that it colluded with publishers to fix prices and weaken rival
Amazon.

The technology giant and five book publishers have been hit by lawsuits on both sides of the Atlantic amid claims that they worked in league to dent Amazon’s lead in the e-book market.

European Union regulators are investigating the companies for breaches of competition law, whilst in the US, the Department of Justice has been suing them for collusion.

However, Apple and four of the five publishers – HarperCollins, Hachette Livrew, Macmillan and Simon & Schuster – have now offered to sell e-books to Amazon at a discount for two years in order to pacify regulators in Europe.

Amazon had established a tight grip on the e-book market through its Kindle e-reading device, but Apple sought to loosen this to help make way for the iPad, which can also be used as an e-reader.

It struck a deal, known as the “agency model”, which allows publishers to set the price of their e-books as long as they guaranteed Apple 30pc of the profits.